Sometimes, the subconscious makes strangers out of fellow travelers. These days, I'm part of a group of ARA subscribers visiting Puglia, the region at the heel of the Italian peninsula's boot. Under breakfast, in the hotel dining room where the buffet is parked, the TV is on with the morning news. They open with Trump, of course, and explain that the tariffs will punish wine, oil, shoes, and Italian fashion in general, but that Giorgia Meloni, who has a good relationship with Musk, will negotiate some reductions with the American government.
I am struck by the moment when Trump raises a panel with the names of each country and their corresponding tariff, as if it were a restaurant price list: China, 34%; the EU, 20%; Vietnam, 46%; Taiwan, 32%… The image is pedestrian because it's so analogous, but today is "Liberation Day," and the president isn't content with the usual photo of him signing some executive order about dangerous universities. He needs an image for history, in which the tariffs and himself appear. Sorry, him and the tariffs.
We visited a winery that had historic movie posters, and I thought I saw Trump brandishing the sign. But no, it was Charlton Heston, very angry, holding up the tablets of the law with the Ten Commandments, about to throw them at the heads of the Israelites who, tired of waiting for Moses to come down from Sinai, had exchanged God for a golden calf. God forbids them from having other gods and making idols, threatens punishment for those who deny him, and promises that he will love those who love him. With a show like this, it was only natural that Charlton Heston's Moses reminded me of Donald Trump.
